SHORT TAKES

MSC.SOFTWARE AND HP SIGN RESELLER AGREEMENT

Los Angeles, CA — MSC.Software Corporation (MSC), a leading developer of simulation software, announced that it is to provide scientists, engineers and technical designers with a pre-integrated and optimized turnkey Linux Cluster solutions based on its MSC.Linux appliances and HP VISUALIZE Personal Workstations from Hewlett-Packard Company. MSC.Software is focusing on the scientific and technical communities, where extreme performance is required to address computationally intense applications. This initiative directly addresses a market worth an estimated $3 billion per year.

“By bringing extreme performance Linux appliances to the worldwide scientific computing community, HP and MSC.Software are teaming to provide customers with a stable, integrated solution,” said Frank Perna, chairman and chief executive officer, MSC.Software Corporation. “MSC.Software is focused on delivering an integrated Linux based combination of hardware and software that has a superior return on investment than existing solutions.” “MSC.Software’s Linux Cluster solution is a desirable turnkey, fully tested solution,” said Jim Zafarana, worldwide marketing manager for HP’s Technical Computing Division. “Combined with the reliability and high performance of HP workstations, this will provide customers with a great price-performance solution. Furthermore, the speed of HP workstations coupled with Linux stability and support from MSC.Software will make it much easier for scientific, engineering and technical design customers to use Linux solutions.” Visit http://www.mscsoftware.com for more information.

CALDERA ACQUIRES SCO’S UNIX DIVISIONS

San Diego, CA — In a sign of Linux’s long-range influence, The Santa Cruz Operation bowed to what it sees as inevitable industry change and sold its Unix-based Server Software and Professional Consulting divisions to Linux vendor Caldera Systems. The deal, signed for $7 million in cash and 28 percent of Caldera’s stock, moves the stewardship of the original AT&T Unix System V, now known as SCO UnixWare, to Caldera ( http://www.caldera.com ), which plans to put a “Linux personality” on top of UnixWare and SCO OpenServer, a small-business Unix. The combination of Linux and a robust, proven Unix “gives developers around the globe one target platform to develop for that can scale to any data center need,” said Ransom Love, president of Caldera.

Love indicated that the Application Programming Interfaces in UnixWare and OpenServer will be geared to work with similar interfaces in Linux. The result would be to allow Linux applications to run on the two operating systems (OSes) with few changes, giving Linux applications access to larger-horsepower servers with sophisticated features, such as “journaling,” he said. A running journal of data and events allows for a quick recovery in case of system failure, something that Linux still lacks, spokesmen for the acquisition said. Both Love and Doug Michels, president of SCO ( http://www.sco.com ), said that SCO will continue its work on 64-bit Unix under development with IBM, and 64-bit Unix will become part of the technology available to Caldera. According to Love, Caldera will then offer four OSes: OpenLinux, OpenServer Unix, UnixWare and 64-bit Monterrey Unix as it becomes available. Caldera will be responsible for selling UnixWare and OpenServer, and will provide the continued maintenance and support for them. Under the arrangement, SCO will receive the revenue stream for OpenServer, which amounted to $11.1 million last quarter.

The intricate financial arrangements mean that Caldera, as the new owner of UnixWare and Open Server, will not be issuing general public licenses for them as it does for Linux. Customers “will have open access to the source code,” Love promised, but their licenses will include restrictions indicating that Caldera is the owner of the OS. “Business users would like someone to have ownership so someone also has responsibility for maintenance and support,” Love said. Caldera closed at $6.94 per share in midweek trading that ranged from $6.88 to $7.25. At the $6.94-per-share price, the Caldera stock SCO will receive in the deal is valued at $121.7 million.

NORTEL NEGOTIATES WITH JDS ON FIBER OPTICS

Ontario, CANADA — Nortel Networks and JDS Uniphase are in talks on a multiyear supply agreement that would ease Nortel’s concerns about JDS’s proposed acquisition of a rival, SDL Inc. The agreement would guarantee Nortel a supply of fiber optic components from JDS Uniphase, the biggest maker of such products, for several years. Nortel, the biggest maker of fiber optic equipment, was one of JDS’s largest customers last fiscal year, accounting for 15 percent of its $1.43 billion in sales. “We are exploring a range of options with JDS that would enable us to address the explosive demand for our optical systems and concerns relating to the proposed merger with SDL,” Jeff Ferry, a Nortel spokesman, said. “Our biggest concern is maintaining supply.”

Nortel expects its sales of fiber optic equipment to exceed $10 billion this year and needs to ensure that it has enough components to make those products and to increase production in the future. If JDS acquires SDL, Nortel will lose a source of components. SDL’s main products are lasers that are used to amplify signals on fiber optic networks. It also makes components that bolster the capacity of those networks. Last month, Nortel and Corning Inc. discussed combining their component businesses and forming a new company bigger than JDS. They called off talks over disagreements on how to value Nortel’s unit and on whether the combination would hurt Corning’s sales by making it less independent. JDS Uniphase and Nortel have been talking since JDS announced the acquisition on July 10, but the discussions are early and terms are undecided, Mr. Ferry said.

VERITAS SOFTWARE AND QLOGIC TEAM UP

Mountain View, CA — VERITAS Software Corporation, the data availability company, and QLogic Corp., the leading SAN infrastructure provider, announced an alliance that will provide customers with integrated storage area network (SAN) solutions for complete SAN management. Under the agreement, the two Companies will bundle and resell VERITAS SANPoint Control with QLogic’s host bus adapters and switches. The software, to be branded “VERITAS SANPoint Control for QLogic,” is designed for open heterogeneous SANs and includes the ability to centrally discover, visualize and zone other vendors’ SAN components, as well as QLogic switches and servers using QLogic host bus adapters. Together, the products from VERITAS Software and QLogic answer the call from Global 2000 IT for end-to-end SAN infrastructure solutions consisting of end nodes, switched fabrics and software to manage them. The agreement also outlines plans for collaboration on delivery of the next level of integration between VERITAS SANPoint Control and QLogic SAN hardware. VERITAS SANPoint Control for QLogic is scheduled to be included with QLogic switches and host bus adapters in October 2000.

“VERITAS SANPoint Control continues to be recognized as the software standard for providing heterogeneous SAN management capabilities to companies that are in need of such a solution to answer their customers’ demands,” said Steve Colman, vice president, strategic alliances and worldwide OEM operations, VERITAS Software. “We’re pleased that QLogic selected our product as the SAN management platform, as this, and other deals like it, allows us to broaden our market reach, positively impacting our customers by providing them with complete SAN solutions.” Visit http://www.veritas.com/ or http://ww/qlogic.com for more information.

HITACHI PARTNERS WITH WYLE SYSTEMS

Brisbane, CA — Hitachi America, Ltd., a subsidiary of Hitachi, Ltd., Tokyo, Japan, and Wyle Systems, LLC, VEBA Electronics Group Member, announced the appointment of Wyle Systems as an authorized distributor for Hitachi Hard Disk Drives (HDD) throughout the United States. Wyle Systems, a leading international distributor of computer systems and storage solutions, offers direct sales and design-in assistance to OEMs, VARs and resellers for Hitachi’s full line of 2.5-inch and 3.5-inch HDD drives.

“Wyle Systems is a well established and reputable distributor that will help broaden our disk drive distribution to meet today’s growing need for storage products with top-quality and high-performance drives from Hitachi,” said Gary Galusha, vice president of North American Hard Disk Drives sales. “We look forward to a strong partnership with Wyle Systems and are confident that its established presence coupled with Hitachi’s family of high-performance drives will ensure Hitachi is at the forefront of the storage market.” Currently, Hitachi’s HDD offerings include 2.5-inch mobile HDD and 3.5-inch SCSI and Fibre Channel HDD offerings. Available 2.5-inch drives for notebook computers range from 5 GB to 20 GB. The newest of these use state-of-the-art component technologies to provide higher data density and faster data throughput. Hitachi’s 3.5-inch family of drives deliver more capacity and a diversity of interface options with up to 73.9 GB capacities. These drives use Ultra 160 SCSI and Fibre Channel interfaces and are designed for high throughput operating environments, such as network and Internet servers, multimedia product and digital video processing. For more information on Hitachi, Ltd., please visit http://www.hitachi.co.jp or http://www.wylesystems.com .

ADVA AND BROCADE ADVANCE OPTIONS FOR SANS

San Jose, CA — ADVA Optical Networking, a leading global provider of optical networking solutions, and Brocade Communications Systems, Inc., a leading provider of Storage Area Networking infrastructure, announced that the two companies have verified interoperability of Brocade SilkWorm Fibre Channel fabric switches with ADVA FSP-II Dense Wavelength Division Multiplexer (DWDM) products. Through ADVA FSP-II DWDM products, SAN customers can interconnect Brocade-based SANs to high speed, fiber optic metropolitan area networks. Brocade SilkWorm switches connect servers with storage devices through a Storage Area Network (SAN), providing a highly available and scalable environment for storage applications. The BROCADE storage networking infrastructure is the ideal foundation for internetworked SANs, supporting applications such as disaster recovery; high-speed remote data mirroring; wide area data replication; remote data backup; digital content distribution; and storage outsourcing. Interconnecting Brocade-based SANs using ADVA’s FSP-II DWDM high-speed transparent solution enables these new types of storage applications at distances up to 80 Kilometers over a high performance optical fiber link, allowing SAN customers to access data on a storage subsystem that may be located across town at performance levels that are nearly equal to direct-attached storage.

“Advances in high performance optical networking are enabling a whole new industry of SAN applications and service offerings, such as outsourced storage, as an alternative to managing a data center in house. Brocade is committed to offering our SAN customers the widest array of options to take advantage of metropolitan area fiber for the high-speed interconnection of servers and storage,” said Jack Cuthbert, Brocade vice president of Worldwide Marketing. “We are pleased to work with ADVA to ensure that our mutual customers can seamlessly internetwork Brocade-based SANs through ADVA’s high performance DWDM solutions.” ADVA FSP-II is designed to meet the requirements of enterprise markets. It is an affordable 32-channel DWDM solution capable of accepting a broad range of data rates. With the ADVA FSP-II solution, up to 32 channels can be extended over a single optical fiber pair, each appearing to have their own virtual fiber link totally independent of the others. Network integrity is assured through the FSP-II’s high reliability and link protection features. FSP-II’s fail-safe dual link switching combined with the highly reliable and scalable Brocade SilkWorm switches, provides a fault-resilient environment for storage applications in which critical data access is protected from a link or channel interface failure. For more information, visit the Brocade website at http://www.Brocade.com .

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